The Captive (32 page)

Marcus, who now had her and Lucy right under his paw.

“Gentlemen, I need your attention, and I need to get word to the stable to put my sidesaddle on Chesterton, and to saddle Damsel for Lucy. We’ll need a groom, too, and your greatest discretion.” She gave them instructions and prayed luck would be with her and with Christian.

For they would both need it.

Gervaise Stoneleigh eyed the missive sitting on his mantel and wondered, not for the first time, if Mercia knew what he was about. A man facing a duel must make his arrangements, that was part of the common sense of the process, but most men facing duels hadn’t had their hands—their bodies, their minds—mangled by their opponent.

Which might give Mercia a tactical advantage, or it might put him at a practical disadvantage.

Or both.

A knock on the door of his library disturbed Stoneleigh’s evening solitude. “Enter.”

“Beg pardon, sir, but a female has come to the door, and she has a child with her. She says she’s a client.” The butler’s face betrayed nothing, not curiosity, disapproval, concern—nothing. Stoneleigh paid him handsome wages to say nothing as well.

“Bring them in.”

Gillian, Lady Greendale, followed the butler in, holding the hand of a golden-haired girl Stoneleigh would guess was about seven or eight years old.

“Hanscomb, a tray with both tea and chocolate, and close the door behind you. Lady Greendale, an unexpected pleasure.”

Another unexpected pleasure.

“I am sorry to impose,” she said, still clutching the child’s hand. “We’ve come up from Severn today, and I couldn’t find the colonel, and His Grace isn’t residing at the ducal town house, but Girard is going to kill him if we don’t warn him.”

A silence ensued while the countess caught her breath and Gervaise puzzled out the sense of her words.

“Perhaps the child might enjoy her chocolate in the kitchen?” Bad enough he was about to discuss a duel with a grown woman. In the child’s presence, such a thing could never be mentioned.

“Lucy stays with me.”

“I can talk,” the girl said. “I’m staying with Cousin Gilly.”

The silent child, then, the one Lady Greendale had despaired of, but silent no more.

“I am to host two damsels in distress,” Stoneleigh said. “Your duke is safe enough as we speak. I know this, for His Grace called on me, and I have some familiarity with his schedule. He will come to no harm tonight.”

He gave the lady a pointed look, and she nodded.

The tale that emerged over sandwiches and tea cakes would give Mercia nightmares for years, provided he lived to hear it, and provided His Grace’s other nightmares didn’t absorb his every sleeping hour. Lady Greendale tried to convey some of the story in adult code, only to be thwarted by the girl.

“Cousin Marcus loved my mama,” Lady Lucy volunteered at one point. “But Mama said he was an amusement to her. She told me that, but when she told Cousin Marcus he grew very angry and said he’d risked everything he had so they could be together. Mama laughed at him, and I crept away.”

“You did the smart thing, then,” Stoneleigh said. “Have another tea cake. They promote sound sleep.”

Lady Greendale’s eyebrows rose, but she nonetheless selected a small raspberry-flavored cake for the girl. Her ladyship was tired, with shadows under her blue eyes and a drawn quality about her mouth. Haring up from Surrey with a child in tow and a would-be murderer likely in pursuit wouldn’t improve a lady’s appearance.

“I wasn’t smart enough,” the girl said, munching her tea cake. “Cousin Marcus knew I was there, and he said if I told one word—even one word—of what I knew, then terrible things would happen. Evan died, then Mama died, and then Papa didn’t come back. What could be more terrible than that?”

“What indeed?” Stoneleigh murmured. “I know something terrible, though not as terrible as your cousin’s mischief. Desperately needing a decent night’s rest and not getting it is terrible.”

The child looked skeptical, the expression showing her resemblance to her father.

“My ladies, I can send you to my sister’s, or you can flaunt all propriety and stay here with me. My staff is most discreet. In the alternative, I can escort you to Mercia’s town house.”

“Marcus will look for us there, and I would not want to involve your sister.”

The general populace regarded the practice of law as an exercise in tedium, when in fact, Drury Lane could offer no more riveting drama.

“Then you shall be my guests.”

He waited for Lady Greendale to tuck the child in, then sent the maid to bring the countess back to his study, because a judicious scolding was in order.

“Lady Greendale, your duke would not want you interfering.” He passed her a finger of brandy, it being a canon of unwritten law that counsel keep the medicinal tot on hand for the occasional distraught client.

“My duke has no idea what he’s up against. Girard won’t offer a fair fight, and no one can warn him but me.”

“I can go.”

She shook her head. “I would not burden you with the details of Marcus’s perfidy. This is a family matter, truly.”

His curiosity was piqued, though he allowed her a moment to sip the brandy. “Another drop?”

“No, thank you.” Lady Greendale was distressed—sorely distressed—but composed. Greendale had no doubt taught her that trick, may the old blighter be cavorting in hell. “Please tell me what you know, Mr. Stoneleigh. I suspect a duel has been planned?”

He told her what he knew: that a contest of honor had been scheduled for the very next morning, though its exact location was as yet uncertain.

***

Unique among his peers, Christian had never met another on the field of honor. Dueling struck him as a chancy way to settle a matter of pride—honor usually didn’t enter into it—particularly for a duke with an obligation to a titular succession.

So he knew not how he should feel when he contemplated single mortal combat with a personal enemy. The exchange with Stoneleigh had put doubts in his mind, and doubts were a liability.

Technically, Girard had played by the rules of war, such as war had rules, but only technically.

Did that matter? To Gilly, it would matter a great deal.

Girard had tormented, but he had also protected. He’d seen to Christian’s welfare, and ultimately, spared Christian’s life—after holding him captive for months.

And he would delight in knowing Christian was afflicted with last-minute doubts.

St. Just sauntered into the breakfast parlor, impeccably turned out for five in the morning.

“You’ve been up all night?” Christian asked, for he’d turned in early and left a morose St. Just to the company of some excellent brandy.

“Nearly. Ran into my father, by the way, who’ll happily have Girard arrested and deported if you’ll let him know the location of this morning’s meeting. Said it has to do with courtesy among dukes.”

“Please give Moreland my thanks if I’m unable, but deportation won’t be necessary.” Nor would it be easily accomplished, if Girard indeed had an English patrimony.

“I doubt Girard would survive deportation. Word of this duel alone will mean his death, do you not see to the matter for him.”

“Girard might welcome death.” Could life itself be a form of captivity? Gilly had nearly reached such an impasse. “His emperor is taken prisoner, he has no cause to fight for, and all his machinations were in vain. Now he finds an English barony hung around his neck, if rumor is to be believed, while any number of British officers will relish his death. This is a failed life by any standard.”

And the notion of accommodating Girard with a tidy, quiet death did not appeal.

“A challenging life. My coach awaits.”

“Thoughtful of you.”

St. Just’s unmarked coach assured privacy—and convenience in the event a body needed transport back to Town. Christian put that thought aside and followed his second out into the predawn gloom.

The journey to the Sheffield Arms passed in silence, and like most mornings as autumn approached, saw a layer of ground fog in the low-lying areas of the terrain.

“The air is still,” St. Just said. “A mercy.”

“With swords, the wind hardly matters as it would have with pistols.”

St. Just scrubbed a hand over his face. “Bloody damned farce, swords.”

“My friend, we are soldiers. We did not sit at the ancestral pile like spiders in our webs and dally with our prey. We fought. As officers, we led the charge. We set the example. We gained the victory.”

St. Just stared at the shadowy hills and fields. “But this charge is not for King and Country. This is a bloody damned duel, and I do not trust that Frenchman to acquit himself honorably.”

“He will.” Of this Christian was certain. “His arrogance and whatever idiosyncrasy passes for his conscience ensure he will behave honorably.”

St. Just said nothing, and the coach rolled into the yard of the Sheffield Arms. Christian climbed out as the sun was nearly peeking over the horizon, and made his way through the trees to the appointed location. Girard had arrived before him, a pair of foils in an elegant case open on a folding table under the trees.

“Good morning, Your Grace.”

“Girard. Or do we address you now as Lord St. Clair?”

The Frenchman looked pained, but Christian no longer had to hear every piece of drivel the man spouted, so he turned his back and waited for St. Just to join them.

The seconds conferred, and the principles limbered up with their weapons, but the surgeons were not yet on the scene.

“You can start without the surgeons,” St. Just said. “I don’t advise it.”

“Another five minutes then,” Christian replied.

As a soldier, he’d seen many sunrises that might have been his last. As a prisoner, he’d gone for weeks without sight of the sun, only to find it too painfully bright when he had been given liberty from his dungeon.

A soldier accepts the possibility of his death, particularly when he’s in captivity.

But Christian was a soldier no longer. He was Mercia, with a responsibility to his people and to his title. He had a daughter who’d seen far too much loss and confusion in her short life.

And he had Gilly.

She was the still place inside of him, the utter conviction that he could not fail. She was the bright light of reason, the warmth of hope, the promise of wisdom sufficient for all the troubles a lifetime could present.

And from her perspective, what Christian undertook with Girard was a betrayal of her.

Quite possibly from Christian’s perspective as well.

“The surgeons are here,” St. Just said. “You can still apologize.”

“Remind me of that again, and I will challenge you, St. Just.”

“See if I’ll volunteer to be your second twice.”

St. Just conferred with his counterpart, a tall, broad-shouldered blond whom Christian recognized as the jailer, the last person to see Christian in captivity.

The man who had, on Girard’s orders, freed the lost duke.

Christian exchanged a nod with the fellow, the jailer looking better fed and better dressed, but as twitchy as ever—and not particularly apologetic.

Upon the signal of Girard’s second, Christian took a position opposite Girard, saluted with his weapon, accepted Girard’s answering civility, and gathered his focus for the moment when St. Just would give them leave—

“Wait!” A female voice broke the morning stillness, and four male heads swiveled back toward the Sheffield Arms. “For the love of God, you must not proceed.”

“Thank Jesus and all the holy angels,” St. Just said. “Your countess has come to rescue you.”

***

Christian, looking composed, tidy, and very much alive, shot his opponent a pointed look. The dark brute who must be Girard saluted with his foil and passed it to a blond fellow hovering near St. Just.

“Countess, good morning.” For a man about to fight for his life, His Grace sounded perishingly steady.

“This is not a good morning,” she said, advancing on him. “What can you be thinking?” She shot a venomous look at Girard. “And you, you do not deserve to die. You deserve to live with the agony of what you tried to do and the fact that you failed utterly to do it.”

“Did I fail?”

Gilly had not one instant to spare for such a creature, or for his Gallic irony. “You cannot kill him like this, Your Grace.”

“Do you mean I am not capable of it, or I should not?”

This distinction mattered to him, Gilly could see that, and she forced herself to pause and choose her words.

“Of course you would dispatch him handily,” she said, her hands fisted on her hips. “But you cannot do murder. You are not some violent beast, a thing without a conscience to kill on a whim or for your own passing pleasure.”

Greendale could have behaved thus, but not her Christian.

Christian shot a look at the Frenchman, who was rolling down his cuffs, not a care in the world.

“I cannot countenance a world with Girard in it, Countess, much less him strolling the English countryside like some squire with his hounds.”

“He will die,” Gilly said. “But not by your hand. You must not. You tried to explain this to me.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” Christian was very still, very quiet, and very unhappy with her.

Her heart, already racing, thumped against her ribs.

“You tried to show me,” she said. “You tried to convey to me, that after years of fighting against a bitter enemy, you can lose yourself in the belief that it’s enough merely to
be
his enemy, even when the hostilities are over. But if you sustain yourself on that bitterness, your foe wins twice, for you are as much his slave as if you were still chained in his dungeon.”

Christian was listening, so Gilly pushed the next words out. “I am no longer Greendale’s drudge, no longer his marital whipping post. You tried to tell me the wars are over. I could not hear you, but you must listen to me now.”

Girard heaved a sigh when Gilly wished an apoplexy would befall him, and still Christian stared at her, as if trying to decipher words in a foreign language.

“Listen to the lady,
mon
duc
,” Girard said in a voice as aggravatingly reasonable as it was damnably attractive. “I am not the one you need to kill, for the war
is
over, and I am among those who lost. We fight with swords so I might have the time to explain this as you drew my blood, and I perhaps drew a bit of yours.”

Girard’s voice was the essence of civility, the French accent soft, the tension in the words razor sharp. “Ask yourself, Your Grace, how Anduvoir knew exactly when and where to capture you. Who knew what you were about, who had something—a great deal—to gain by your death?”